Why I hate catfish….

I can relate to your friend's experience because a friend of mine was put through something similar or worse. There was a whole scheme involved, with more than one person. She is a lesbian but was led to fall in love with a young man who took pride in "turning" her sexual orientation. I and other friends were suspicious that something was not right with this long-distance relationship, but she was convinced. She posted rapturous declarations of love on her social media. Then the young man was supposedly dying in a hospital far away where she could not travel to see him, and she was heartbroken. Then she figured out somehow that the whole situation was fake, and she was able to trace it to someone who apparently makes a point of messing with gay and lesbian people's minds through this kind of scheme. Needless to say the whole experience was devastating. 💔

At the very same time I think that alternate or fake personas are just part of the reality of online life. I appreciate what you do when you identify that someone is using other people's photos, especially when they are personal photos from someone's social media like the situation you posted about the other day. But it is also up to each and every one of us to beware. This is going to get more and more prevalent as the technology of altered photos and videos advances. Every website is potentially going to be like Second Life where everyone knows that the person they are interacting with and possibly falling in love with is probably nothing like that in real life. A strong reason to try to have real-life friends and not depend on our online connections only...